


Holidays Carlisle Despises

by kmm530



Category: Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:29:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27255724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kmm530/pseuds/kmm530
Summary: There are two holidays Carlisle wishes he could wipe off the calendar. They are his birthday and Father's Day.
Relationships: Carlisle Cullen/Esme Cullen
Kudos: 17





	Holidays Carlisle Despises

**Author's Note:**

> Carlisle strikes me as a character who would have almost everything together, which makes him a great leader but have a bit of inner turmoil that never settles with some things, which makes him human. Hence, this.

There are two holidays Carlisle wishes he could wipe off the calendar. They are his birthday and Father's Day.

June is the month Carlisle never looks forward to.

Unless one of his children insists, Carlisle is never one to celebrate holidays that revolves around himself. 'Holidays' included his birthday and Father’s Day. They were trivial things in his mind - days and events he never feels the need to celebrate because he already has everything he could want. He had expressed such sentiment before, to Esme, and she had smiled gently at him.

“Would you deny those who love you the chance to show you?”

He would not deny his love or his children a thing, so every year he plays his part, graciously accepting gifts from his sons and daughters, putting them to good use. He smiles and thanks them individually.

But if Carlisle is being honest (Carlisle liked to be honest, he prided himself on being honest, he never wanted to lie to his family and hurt them), there was a different reason he dislikes celebrating both days. A much harder one to hear, a much harder one to heal from, a reason he never wants to become. His own father. (But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t be honest with them about this.)

Not one of Carlisle’s human birthdays, from what he could recollect, had passed without a murder, the slaughter of an innocent woman or child the pastor ( _his father_ ) had projected his fears onto. And every year, it was Carlisle’s present. He was awarded the honour of sending these people to their graves. And every year, out of fear or respect for his father (it was fear, it was always fear), Carlisle accepted this. Every year, he had to see the pain in the eyes of the person (usually a woman, always a woman) in front of him. He had to hear the fear in their breaking voices as they cried out for mercy (mercy, mercy, please!). None was ever given, and Carlisle walked away from the stakes every year, a mountain of wood-burning sky-high behind him.

Carlisle felt himself a monster before he ever became a vampire.

Carlisle cannot bring himself to celebrate Father's Day without the persuasion of his children. It is a dark and chrismal day for him, one he always tried to work and one he was never allowed to: ‘Go home to your family, Dr. Cullen. We can manage a day without you. Spend today with those teenagers of yours.’

Carlisle, looking back, would never have celebrated such a day for his own father, even if such a day had existed.

And honestly? Maybe he himself doesn't feel worthy of being celebrated.

He certainly doesn't feel worthy of anything when Rosalie snaps at him (and he knows, _he knows_ , that it’s her way of coping, of grieving, and that she loves him, but by God, if it doesn’t hurt when she’s angry with him directly); when Jasper won’t talk to him (and he knows, _knows_ , that Jasper will come ‘round, talk to someone, maybe Rosalie, or Emmett, probably Alice, but it still hurts when his son is hurting and he feels less of a father when he can’t help the pain go away). He doesn't feel worthy when Emmett looks away from Carlisle’s gaze in shame the first time he slips up (there is nothing worse in the world than looking to comfort your child and having them pull away from the embrace they’d always accepted before). He doesn't feel worthy when Alice begs him to help her figure out who she was before, and he comes back empty-handed (he wishes that he could provide answers for her, but his heart breaks when he can't). He cannot feel worthy when Edward lacks what the rest of them have found when there is no lack of love in his son’s life but there is a gaping hole in his heart, and Carlisle only wishes he could do something to fill that void (because the rest of them have each other, and Edward is so lonely).

The best he can do is give them his unconditional, infinite love and support, time and do the best he can do for them, and pray that someday, somehow, it will be enough. (As though loving all of them with his whole being can make up for the lives he’s taken, the pain he’s caused. But he still wishes it could be.)

So he spends his birthday in mourning and Father’s Day in pretense (he’s gotten so good at it that Edward and Jasper don’t know a thing, don’t feel a thing, other than what they should), wishing and praying that such days would end. Because the days bring nothing but anger and sadness and guilt to him, and that is not something he wishes to bring to the rest of his family.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> xx


End file.
